Category Archives: potty training

Don’t Squeeze and Pull

Considering my daughter’s aversion to properly using the toilet, and the pains of potty training, I thought I would get an early start on my son. My goal is to have at least one of them fully potty trained before they turn five. Ducky is two, so this should go well. Ally is almost four, and this has not gone well.

I don’t know a whole lot about male urination, except that they do it standing up. I mean, I have been in the bathroom while it has happened, but usually I would be standing at the sink or counter doing whatever it is I was doing, with a man by the toilet. Just because I was in the same room doesn’t mean I was paying close attention to the process.

I didn’t give it much thought, but figured, how hard could this be? I took my son over to the potty, got him undressed, and decided to show him how it should be done. As it turns out, I know less about male urination than I previously thought. I looked at my son’s tiny penis and was under the impression that for urine to come out, I would have to manipulate it somehow. I positioned it towards the potty, squeezed and pulled, and was met with a loud unearthly shriek. I released and tried again, pinching a bit higher this time. He pushed my hand away and started slapping and screaming at me.

Although I wasn’t paying attention when men have used the bathroom in my presence, I could have sworn there was no screaming involved. Obviously I was doing something wrong and that is now how you get urine out of a penis.

Before traumatizing my son any further and causing him to shudder at the thought of using the bathroom the rest of his life, recalling the time his mother almost castrated him, I decided to look into this a bit.

I went to Google. Not once in my life would I have guessed that I would ever look up “how do men pee?” Aside from the really bizarre things that came up, there are actual instructional videos online for this very reason. I may be the only woman who thought a penis needed to be milked like a cow, but I am not the only mother who doesn’t know how to potty train her son. Apparently you just hold it there. That’s it. Hrm… Tomorrow, if Ducky isn’t too scared, we can try this again.

I Don’t Like Pants

In case you didn’t know, I don’t like pants. If you do know, then this post comes as no surprise.

In fact, if you have ever even met me, you would know this about me as I make it a point to announce my disdain for the clothing item from the beginning. “Hi, I’m Christene. I don’t like pants. How are you?” Just like that.

It is then no wonder that my children have also caught on to this. Unfortunately they are not fully immersed in this whole socialization thing, so they don’t quite understand that even though we don’t like pants, we still kind of have to wear them. Especially in public.

My daughter is *still* not potty trained. At this point I am just waiting for society to shame her into it, because I have clearly gone wrong somewhere. She knows how to use the potty, has done so in the past, but for whatever reason absolutely refuses to do it on a regular basis. So I took away her diapers, put her in regular underwear, and hope the discomfort helps her figure it out.

The only thing she has figured out is how to change herself. But not all the way. She will remove her soiled clothes, clean herself off, put on new underwear, but no pants. Ever. I asked, and she shrugged, replying something along the lines of “why bother?”

Despite the fact that I am notorious for not wearing pants around the house, I think I am going to have to implement a new pants rule, and actually follow it myself. No one within the parameters of my home can remove their pants for prolonged periods of time. There. Done. Pants wearing shall commence. And pantlessness shall be punished with time-outs and solitary confinement.

So basically, as soon as I get home tonight, I am going straight to my room.

Today I was going to….

Today I was going to write an awesome post about potty training your child. Except I don’t know how to do that properly. If I did, my daughter would be potty trained already. We are still working on it.
So, I sat down, and decided that instead, I am going to write about ways to sleep train your baby.  I would create a very aesthetically pleasing bullet point how-to sheet every mother could use. Then I realized I clearly have no clue there either. If I did, my son would be sleeping through the night, and I would not be so sleep deprived.
Which is probably why I am coming up with fictitious topics in the first place.
I racked my brain trying to find topics I actually know something about. Oh I know! I would write about putting on make-up! I am exceptionally good at it. Except, what does that have to do with parenting? My daughter is WAY too young to be putting on make-up…. Unless I turned into one of the crazy pageant moms. In which case, she would be the perfect age. But if she was a pageant mini beauty, then I would not necessarily want to share my make-up tricks with the world because then other babies would be putting on their make-up the same way, and then my daughter would no longer have an edge in the pageant world. And she would be a has-been of beauty before she even turns four. She would grow up with all sorts of complexes and confidence issues, all thanks to my thoughtless post almost two decades earlier. Clearly I cannot write about putting on make-up. Too much is at stake.
Zombies. I know absolutely nothing about zombies. But I heard they are a thing now. People are talking about them. ButI know some stuff about parenting. So I could totally write about baby zombies. Except they don’t exist. Not the zombies, they totally exist according to rumours, but the baby zombies, they don’t exist. If we were to ever have an apocalypse, and a zombie take-over would occur, babies would be the ones to survive. So we can cross that off the list.
Arts and crafts are a wonderful topic. Safe. Matronly/motherly, whatever. Perfect for a mommy blog. Perfect for my target audience. Which is not to say I actually have a target audience. Because I don’t. I am not organized or focused enough to come up with one of those. But, nevertheless, arts and crafts are a great subject. They can apply to anyone. I tried to remember the last artsy thing I made. I wanted to surprise my mother-in-law with a stocking stuffer of a one of those cute clay discs that has your kid’s hand/footprint on it. Munchie came home from daycare with one of those last year and my MIL loved it. So I thought Ducky should make one for her too. The clay hardened as I was mixing it. It crumbled everywhere and invaded our kitchen counter before making its way into the trash. My son’s hands/feet never got anywhere near it. Ok, minor setback. What else did I make? I am in the process of making Ducky a baby blanket. At this rate, it will be done before his tenth birthday, by which point it will be way too small for him. Maybe if we stop feeding him he won’t grow much between now and then. Or I could just make a bigger blanket. But then it will take even longer to make, and it won’t be ready until his twentieth birthday. And by then he will be even bigger, so it still won’t fit him. Um…I will get back to this one.
So I was going to write about something. It would have been witty, informative, entertaining, maybe insightful. Maybe tomorrow. Or in a few months when I get this potty training business under control. Then I will have a brilliant post outlining just what I did to get there. As of right now, not a whole lot. But I will keep you posted.